Obstruction

Obstruction Of Justice

Thus far, the most visible example of “obstruction” is the firing of James Comey as FBI Director on May 9. In his testimony on June 8, 2017, he stated that he felt he was fired for how he was handling the Russian investigation. On June 9, Rep. Al Green filed for impeachment, based Comey’s firing. His proposed replacement is Christopher Wray, “Bridgegate” defense attorney for Trump’s friend NJ Gov. Chris Christie. Wray’s law firm represents the Russian state-owned oil giants Gazprom and Rosneft, whose biggest deal in history with Sec. of State Rex Tillerson‘s ExxonMobil was stopped by Obama’s sanctions for annexing Crimea and Ukraine. These sanctions have been the subject of reported conversations between Russians and the Trump Campaign.

By MICHAEL S. SCHMIDT January 4, 2018 “Among the other episodes, Mr. Trump described the Russia investigation as “fabricated and politically motivated” in a letter that he intended to send to the F.B.I. director at the time, James B. Comey, but that White House aides stopped him from sending. Mr. Mueller has also substantiated claims that Mr. Comey made in a series of memos describing troubling interactions with the president before he was fired in May.”NY Times

Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-IL) called on Chair Bob Goodlatte (R-VA) to invite Trump before panel to testify under oath as Trump declared in the Rose Garden press conference following Comey’s testimony. The HillLetter June 9, 2017

“Trump spoke to Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats and National Security Agency Director Adm. Michael Rogers after Comey revealed in March that the bureau had launched a probe into alleged collusion. Both Coats and Rogers were uncomfortable with the nature of the President’s request and refused to comply, the sources with knowledge of the situation told CNN.” CNN

“I hope you can let this go,” the president told Mr. Comey, according to the memo.

The documentation of Mr. Trump’s request is the clearest evidence that the president has tried to directly influence the Justice Department and F.B.I. investigation into links between Mr. Trump’s associates and Russia. Late Tuesday, Representative Jason Chaffetz, the Republican chairman of the House Oversight Committee, demanded that the F.B.I. turn over all “memoranda, notes, summaries and recordings” of discussions between Mr. Trump and Mr. Comey.”

Such documents, Mr. Chaffetz wrote, would “raise questions as to whether the president attempted to influence or impede” the F.B.I.

Mr. Comey wrote the memo detailing his conversation with the president immediately after the meeting, which took place the day after Mr. Flynn resigned, according to two people who read the memo.” NY Times

“Graham on Sunday called for legislation to protect special counsel Robert S. Mueller III; House Majority Leader Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) dismissed the idea. Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) decries attacks on the Mueller; House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) lifts not a finger to restrain, let alone remove, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), who is prepared to endanger national security with the release of his memo and spends waking hours thinking up new smears to hurl at the intelligence community.

Mueller Zeros In on Story Put Together About Trump Tower Meeting NY Times By JO BECKER, MARK MAZZETTI, MATT APUZZO and MAGGIE HABERMAN January 31, 2018: “Mr. Corallo is planning to tell Mr. Mueller about a previously undisclosed conference call with Mr. Trump and Hope Hicks, the White House communications director, according to the three people. Mr. Corallo planned to tell investigators that Ms. Hicks said during the call that emails written by Donald Trump Jr. before the Trump Tower meeting — in which the younger Mr. Trump said he was eager to receive political dirt about Mrs. Clinton from the Russians — “will never get out.” That left Mr. Corallo with concerns that Ms. Hicks could be contemplating obstructing justice, the people said.”

Trump started working on whittling away ethics rules before taking office which hides potential evidence:

“The new rule states that records created, generated or received by the congressional office of a House member “are exclusively the personal property of the individual member” and that the member “has control over such records,” according to a report by OpenSecrets.org. After congressional ethics experts, voters, and President-elect Donald Trump forced House Republicans to back down last week from a rules change that would have eviscerated the independent Office of Congressional Ethics, one important sentence quietly slipped through another rule change. That sentence enables individual members to hide official documents that could prove embarrassing or even incriminating if they were suddenly investigated by the ethics office or the Justice Department for criminal activity. Sheila Krumholz, executive director of the Center for Responsive Politics, said Monday that the rules change “is not good” and threatens to erode ethical oversight in government further. She said it leads to a situation where “There’s no cop on the beat – that we’ve lost a critical element of independent oversight” over government records and members’ activities.” Business Insider